Arthurine Yu –
Undergraduate Student, University of Toronto

Supervisor: Dr. Vijay Ramaswamy

Project: “Overcoming treatment resistance in very high-risk childhood medulloblastoma”

Generously funded by BTFC donors

“Being awarded a Brain Tumour Research Studentship means potential, opportunity, and impact. Receiving this award from the BTFC is an incredible honour, and I am deeply grateful to the generous donors for funding this opportunity. The support of BTFC and its donors fuels my passion for conducting research in the field of neuro-oncology, as I hope to make a positive impact in the scientific community. This award allows me to study treatment resistance in medulloblastoma at The Hospital for Sick Children during the summers of 2024 and 2025.

I am extremely interested in the interdisciplinary approaches to medical research in Dr. Vijay Ramaswamy’s lab, combining life sciences with computer programming and contributing to my academic goals. At the early stages of my educational and professional journey, this award will allow me to explore my potential in research further, fostering a space for personal growth, while improving the treatment of medulloblastoma. I will be entering my third year of conducting scientific research, and I truly recognize the significant impacts of research.

Thank you to BTFC donors for supporting brain tumour research and for allowing me this incredible opportunity. As an aspiring physician-scientist, I look forward to what lies ahead!”

Midpoint Report – September 2024

This summer in the Ramaswamy Lab, I focused on contributing to one of the existing projects, studying medulloblastoma subtypes with a focus on MYC amplified Group 3. It has been previously identified that there are similarities between disease recurrence and the activation of certain signaling pathways in both Group 3 and 4 medulloblastoma. Therefore, we tested two separate drugs in Group 3 medulloblastoma mice models. As we had uncovered in our in-vivo studies over the summer, therapeutic targeting of the PI3-AKT-mTOR pathway, while being effective in Group 4, unfortunately does not have a clear survival benefit for Group 3, suggesting that this subtype is resistant to treatment. However, we successfully visualized spinal cord metastasis in our in vivo models, which has enabled us to establish a protocol to study metastasis in Groups 3 and 4. Our in vivo model, which we plan to use in future research, will allow us to further study medulloblastoma and refine our understanding of the drivers of metastasis. Step by step, we aim to deepen our understanding of medulloblastoma, translate these findings into clinical applications, and ultimately, make a meaningful impact on the lives of brain tumour patients.

Receiving the BTFC Research Studentship award has had a significant impact on my personal and professional growth. My amazing experience at SickKids this summer has strengthened my passion for conducting brain tumour research, reaffirming my aspirations of becoming a physician-scientist to advance our understanding of this complex field. I am continuing my work on this project in connection with a fourth-year thesis course at the University of Toronto where we will aim to validate the Group 3 and 4 Medulloblastoma metastatic potential. However, looking ahead further, I aim to continue conducting research in the field of neuro-oncology, translating scientific findings into clinical applications. Ultimately, the BTFC Research Studentship Award further inspires me to make positive and meaningful impacts on brain tumour research.

Final Report – October 2025

Building on my work completed in the Ramaswamy Lab last summer and my first thesis project at the University of Toronto, I expanded our established medulloblastoma models to examine how radiation shapes metastatic behaviour in MYC-amplified Group 3 tumours. Using mCherry/luciferase-tagged intracranial mouse models, I tracked tumour dynamics through bioluminescence imaging before and after whole-brain irradiation. Our findings suggested that while radiation effectively suppressed primary tumour growth, post-treatment analyses revealed widespread metastatic dissemination across the central nervous system (brain and spinal cord), liver, and bone marrow–a striking finding suggesting that radiation may inadvertently enable metastatic escape.

These results provide a new model for relapsed metastatic medulloblastoma, a significant contributor to deaths in Group 3 medulloblastoma. The next phase of our research will be to leverage RNA sequencing and reinjection studies to identify the molecular pathways governing metastatic relapse, with the long-term goal of developing combination therapies that maintain tumour control while preventing metastatic dissemination. Together, these discoveries will deepen our understanding of treatment-driven metastasis and open new avenues for safer approaches to treating high-risk brain tumours.

The BTFC Research Studentship has been pivotal in my journey, allowing me to grow from a summer research student into an independent researcher. This project allowed me to learn new laboratory skills, integrating in vivo experimentation with imaging tools, culminating in my Second-Place Oral Presentation Award and Top Abstract Award in the Developmental, Stem Cell & Cancer Biology research program, at the 2025 SickKids Summer Research Program Symposium. As I move into my second thesis project, a collaboration project I initiated between the Ramaswamy Lab and the Yip Lab with the University of Toronto’s Dean of Applied Science & Engineering, Dr. Christopher Yip, this experience affirmed my goals of pursuing an MD/MD-PhD to translate scientific discoveries into tangible improvements in patient care.